Prized Possessions (48 page)

Bernard said nothing for a moment. He lit two cigarettes and passed one over the table to Lizzie who took it and inhaled, absently.

The sun had shifted into the west. The front of the cottages lay in shadow, the soft, blue-grey, unrepeatable shadow of early spring. But across the road the trees behind the railings of the estate were filled with sunlight, gnarled trunks gilded, buds and unfolding leaves trembling not with a mid-afternoon breeze but with the thrill of the light itself.

Lizzie stared out at the painted scene, and smoked her cigarette.

Bernard said, ‘Tell me about Polly.'

Lizzie spoke without meeting his eye, like a person in a play whose words were meant for the audience.

‘Polly,' she said. ‘That's even worse.'

‘Why is it worse?'

‘He took her to the house. He took her there in his motorcar. To meet his relatives. She says he wants to marry her.'

‘An' does she want to marry him?' said Bernard.

‘She says she does.'

‘You knew nothin' about this romance?'

‘I had an inklin',' Lizzie said, uncomfortably. ‘But I never thought it would come to anythin'. I mean, I thought Polly was far too sensible ever to get mixed up wi' a man like Dominic Manone.'

‘Because he's Italian?'

‘Because he's a crook.'

‘Polly knows that, of course,' Bernard stated.

Lizzie jerked her head, frowning. ‘She does. She must.'

‘An' loves him in spite of it?' It was on the tip of Bernard's tongue to add
‘Or because of it,'
but he had too much savvy to let it slip out.

‘I don't know if she loves him,' Lizzie said. ‘I never know what Polly's thinkin' or what she feels about anythin' these days.'

‘You know she still loves
you,
' Bernard said.

‘If she did, she wouldn't … God!' Lizzie exclaimed, desperately. ‘How can I stand up to a man like Dominic Manone?'

‘Do you want to, Lizzie?' Bernard asked. ‘I think that's the question you've got to ask yourself. Do you really want to?'

‘I can't let her do it, can't let her throw her life away.'

‘Would you rather she married someone like Patrick Walsh?' Bernard said. ‘From what I gather Polly got rid of
him
pretty quick when he showed signs of gettin' serious.'

‘Are you suggestin' that Dominic Manone's the right man for her?'

‘Polly seems to think so,' Bernard said.

‘She's too young to…'

‘She's not too young,' Bernard said. ‘She's – what? – two or three years older than you were when you had her.'

‘That's got nothin' to do with it,' Lizzie said.

‘It's got everythin' to do with it,' said Bernard. ‘She's your eldest, Lizzie, more like you than you might care to admit. In my opinion, for what it's worth, Polly could do worse than hitch up with Dominic Manone.'

‘How can you possibly say that? He's a criminal.'

‘Well,' Bernard said, ‘there's a lot of those about these days, Lizzie, in and out of jail. Look around you. What do you see? Councillors linin' their own pockets, coppers takin' bribes, members of the parliament up to their armpits in trickery and graft. Look at the street corners, dearest, an' tell me truthfully if you'd rather your daughter married one of those louts, one of those shiftless, never-work-again types than Dominic Manone.'

‘That's not fair,' Lizzie said. ‘There are plenty o' decent folk in the Gorbals, thousands of honest, hard-workin' men for Polly to choose from.'

‘Aye,' Bernard said. ‘But it seems she prefers Dominic Manone.'

Lizzie put down the cigarette. She folded her arms across her breasts and hugged herself, rocking a little from side to side in the chair. ‘I never thought I'd hear this from you, Bernard,' she said. ‘I thought you'd tell me how to stop her, how to turn her away from this marriage.'

Choosing his words with considerable care, Bernard said, ‘I notice you're not askin me to step in an' stop Babs marryin'
her
young man.'

‘That's different. It's too late to do anythin' about Babs.'

‘Do you think Manone will put Polly on the streets?'

‘Don't be so daft.'

‘Do you think he won't protect her?'

‘No, he'll certainly do that.'

‘I don't want to sound callous,' Bernard told her, ‘but Polly will be safer with Manone than with anyone else. He won't let any harm come to her. He won't let anythin' from outside touch her. He'll keep her safe an' well provided for, whatever happens.'

Thoroughly confused, Lizzie shook her head.

‘I thought you were honest, Bernard,' she stammered. ‘I thought you were against all that stuff.'

‘I'm honest,' Bernard said, ‘only because I have to be. Most times I'm happy to be the way I am. But I may as well tell you, now an' then I wish I wasn't so damned honest. I wish I had just a wee bit more
grab
in me, a wee bit less conscience. Never more so than now. There are no premiums paid out on honesty these days, Lizzie, an' things are not goin' to get much better. Soon it'll be every man for himself, an' take what you can get.'

‘An' will you do that, will you take what you can get?'

‘Nope,' Bernard said. ‘The only thing I want, dearest, is you.'

*   *   *

It was rare, very rare, for Guido and Teresa Manone to be seen out together, walking not hand-in-hand but hand-on-arm like any elderly couple from the big houses in Manor Park Road.

Teresa had insisted upon dragging her husband from the lunch table to take her walking in the park. She had already dragged him from the breakfast table to accompany her to church, for Guido was indrawn and compliant these days, chastened by she knew not what. While he was still prone to grumble he no longer dismissed her claims upon him out of hand; an improvement in relations that Teresa put down to Dominic's up-and-coming engagement to the Conway girl who, even if she were a Scot, seemed to have taken Dominic's measure well enough to want to marry him.

Unfortunately Teresa had no yardstick for measuring the Scots girl. She knew that Polly was the daughter of Lizzie and Frank Conway but she had no intimate knowledge of what had happened to Frank, apart from the fact that he had embezzled a large sum of money from Carlo and had gone off and got himself killed in the war.

She had no curiosity about Lizzie whatsoever, had never once enquired why the big, rather blowsy woman would turn up from time to time to engage her nephew in conversation or why she, that woman, enjoyed a privilege denied to most of Dominic's clients. She was not even sure that Lizzie Conway was ‘a client', or even what that word meant. She had consciously courted ignorance of the Manones' affairs since that night – a hundred years ago, it seemed – when she had relinquished her virginity to Guido and with it all rights to individuality.

If she had been blessed with children she might have made her mark through them, ensuring that they were her soldiers, her warriors in the matrimonial war, and through them have reclaimed some of what had been lost to her. But she was old now and her husband, whether he would admit it or not, was old too. All she had to call her own was Dominic, and he had never been hers in the first place. Soon the girl, the stranger, would arrive in her house and steal away the last crumbs of her usefulness.

She walked slowly by Guido's side along the curving path under the plane trees, leaning upon him, obliging him to match his long, creaking stride to her dainty steps.

Sunday in April, a warm afternoon; crocuses fading and daffodils spraying from the grass, children and dogs and courting couples, old couples too, and single men, poor men, spread over the green acres. On the horizon reared the steeples, cranes and scaffolding of industrial Clydeside, a region and a culture about which Teresa knew little.

In silence they strolled half the circuit, a sedate, almost stately couple. She had fur on her hat and collar. He sported spats on top of his hand-lasted shoes. His black alpaca overcoat was buttoned up to the throat, for although the breeze was warm and the young girls were already bare-armed Guido's blood was thinning and the cold was all inside.

Then Teresa said, ‘I want to go home.'

‘Very well,' Guido said. ‘If you are tired we will turn about.'

‘Home,' Teresa said, ‘to Italy.'

He stopped in his tracks and looked down at her. A frown creased his forehead like the imprint of an axe. ‘When did this fit come upon you, woman?' he said. ‘Home? Scotland is our home.'

‘Dominic has no need of us now, Guido.'

‘He will always have need of us.'

‘He will have a new wife to look after him.'

‘You do not like her, do you?' Guido said.

‘I like her well enough.'

‘Because she is not Italian, you do not like her.'

‘Guido, I just want to go home.'

‘Phah!' he exclaimed, not loudly. ‘Italy? What is there for us in Italy? What would I do there? Would you have me pretend I am still a soldier and go marching down the Via Roma waving a flag for the new emperor? Besides, Carlo will never let us go.'

‘If you ask him, if you tell him that you are old and tired…'

‘Old? I am not old, and I'm certainly not tired.'

‘Look at you,' Teresa said. ‘You cannot walk round the park with me without stopping every twenty paces to catch your breath. No, it is time to go home, Guido, to put all this behind us and sit together in the sun.' She hesitated. ‘There are pretty girls in Genova too. If you pay them enough they will provide you with company.'

‘I have no interest in girls.'

‘Write to Carlo. Tell him we want to leave.'

‘I will tell him no such thing.' Guido drew her after him, pinching her sleeve. He found a bench and pushed her on to it, folded himself down beside her, big hands hanging between his knees, shoulders slumped. ‘We cannot go back to Genova. Carlo still has enemies there. He has enemies everywhere. Why do you think he forbids Dominic to visit his motherland? Why do you think he refuses to let Dominic visit him in America?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘Dominic is safe here. In Italy or America he would be in danger.'

‘This is nonsense,' Teresa said. ‘The stories that men make up.'

‘Why does Carlo have to make up stories?'

‘To seem more important than he is,' Teresa said. ‘He does not want you near him, that is the true story. He does not want you on the same piece of land that he stands on. Apart from that, he does not care about us. We have done everything he has asked of us for forty years. Now it is Dominic's turn. He will take care of his wife and she will take care of him. She knows what he does and what he will continue to do and, like me, she will accept it. If she is sensible she will not question him. He must have settled that matter or he would not be proposing marriage. So' – Teresa sighed gently – ‘there is nothing to keep us here, Guido. It is time for us to go.'

‘Jesus and Joseph!' Guido said, shaking his head. ‘Jesus and Joseph.'

‘Do not blaspheme, if you please.'

‘I will blaspheme if I feel like it,' the old man said, sulkily.

‘If you are afraid to write to Carlo and ask him to let us go home then talk to Dominic. He will write to his father on our behalf.'

‘I do not need Dominic to do my dirty…' Guido's frown deepened. ‘I mean, to communicate with my brother. I will write to Carlo myself.'

‘That's good,' said Teresa, as if the matter were closed.

‘If,' Guido said, ‘
if
and when I decide that we are no longer wanted here.'

‘Or needed,' Teresa added.

‘I suppose we could probably afford to purchase a little place down the coast,' Guido said.

‘Where?' said Teresa. ‘Viareggio, Livorno, Piombino perhaps?'

‘I was thinking of Saltcoats or Largs,' said Guido.

‘Italy,' the woman said. ‘Italy. I want to go home. I want to go home.'

She got up and walked away from the bench as if she intended to start her journey back to Genoa there and then, with or without his sanction.

At first Guido did not move, nothing that is except his head which rolled on his scraggy neck so that he could stare after her. He cursed softly and savagely under his breath.

She had told him nothing that he did not already know: that he was finished here, that his work was done, that it was indeed time to go sit in the sun. But he did not feel finished, did not feel that he had accomplished what he had set out to do, that he had escaped the shadow of his own folly, that loony half-hour when he had taken Frank Conway's mistress for himself. He had nobody to blame but himself for the fact that Carlo had cast him off or, rather, had left him behind.

Guido, old Guido, glowered at the retreating figure of his wife.

If he listened to her, if he allowed her to nag him into leaving Scotland, who would construct the deal with Pirollo, who would keep the managers up to scratch and ensure that honour money was paid on time; that ruthless men like McGuire or the incumbent Flint or others who had not yet shown themselves would not reach out and snatch what belonged to the Manones?

He did not need his wife to answer those questions. He knew the answer in his heart: Dominic would.

He stared bleakly along the path through the bands of spring shadow.

She was right, of course. He hated her for being right.

She was right in urging him to bow out, not to become some carping old nuisance tucked away in a villa on the Clyde coast, close enough to interfere but too far away to exert much influence. What he hated most, though, was the idea that he would be stuck with Teresa in a country that he no longer cared about or even remembered very well. He could not tell her that, however, in case he needed her to look after him tomorrow or the next day, whenever old age struck.